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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/magpiewriting on 2026-05-19 17:33:56+00:00.

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I don’t know that I believe in ghosts.

When I offhandedly mention that Ruby’s Antiques is haunted, most people conjure up ideas of ghouls and spirits and spectral echoes floating and fluttering through the narrow, crowded aisles. They think I’m talking about long-dead souls attached to objects they once owned, lingering in confusion or malevolence. But Ruby’s Antiques isn’t haunted by ghosts.

At least…I wouldn’t call the things that make a home here ghosts.

Ruby’s Antiques is haunted the way survivors of some horrific accident are haunted. Tragedy and terror soak the brocade wallpaper and scuffed, varnish-sticky flooring, and settle over everything like a heavy layer of dust and cobwebs.

Strange things have happened here as long as I’ve worked here, but…never anything quite so awful as a few weeks ago.

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That particular day started as they always do. Being the only employee, I opened the shop with a brass key and a flip of the hand-painted placard hanging in the only window.

The owner—an older woman I’ve met in person only once, Mrs. Rutledge—lets me set the hours I work, so the store opens anytime from sunrise to sunset, on most days of the week.

The fact that the shop opens and closes according to my schedule should have given me pause when I met Mrs. Rutledge for the hiring interview, but. Desperate times, etcetera etcetera.

Immediately after opening the shop, before taking up the register, I migrated to our music section. We have a seemingly infinite record collection—yes, I’ve tried counting it, and I gave up after three days in a row of barely making a dent—and a pristine gramophone that softly creaks out its music over the entire shop. I chose one of my favourite records, from a collection that looks at least somewhat recognizable. I’ve found it’s best practice not to stray too far from normal.

Some of these songs can’t be found anywhere else, and my musical selection’s a big hit amongst my regulars.

With a slight crackle, a honeyed voice underpinned by smooth brass instruments echoed out of the gramophone. Satisfied, I tucked a misbehaving tuft of hair behind my ear and took my seat behind the register, humming quietly along to a song I’d never heard before. Familiar leather creaked under my weight and the golden lamp on my desk flicked to life with a hum and a buzz, and my day officially began.

The morning passed quietly.

My first customers were a mother and her young son, faces I’d never seen before. They ventured into the dreaded doll section and returned half an hour later with a pudgy porcelain doll that had too many teeth painted in its open, smiling mouth. The little boy looked absolutely delighted by his find; his mother, significantly less so. I pasted on my best customer service smile and processed the purchase swiftly and efficiently, so I could get that horrible fucking doll away from me.

I’d never seen it before. That’s not uncommon, in the doll section. They’re always changing.

Nobody showed up for a few hours after that. Closer to noon, one of my regulars hurried in, baseball cap slung low over his bloodshot eyes, flannel shirt smeared with grease and dust where it clung to his broad shoulders.

“Good morning, Mr. Callahan,” I said, tracking his movement towards the back of the store.

Mr. Callahan lifted his chin and stared at me. Even beneath the shadow of his cap, his eyes were dark and heavy and piercing, dull pinpricks in my skin. “How many times do I gotta tell you, kid? Just call me Cal.”

As far as I can tell, everyone calls Mr. Callahan “Cal”. Everyone except me.

I shrugged. “Store policy,” I told him truthfully, the way I always did when he complained about my formality. “If you’d like to register a complaint, I can put you in contact with Mrs. Rutledge—”

“No. No, no thanks, don’t need to get her involved.” He hustled away very quickly after that.

Shame. I liked talking to Mr. Callahan. Maybe a little more than I should, but that’s neither here nor there.

I ate lunch behind the register—a messy ham-and-cheese sandwich I’d slapped together that morning, groggy and half-hungover from a boring night out—and sold a lovely set of earrings and a rickety chair to a couple unfamiliar customers. I was considering slipping out into the aisles to see what Mr. Callahan was up to when my phone buzzed on the desk.

I flipped it over. Mrs. Rutledge’s name glared up at me from the screen, along with a photo of twisting rosebushes I’d never set as her contact photo.

“Mrs. Rutledge? How may I help you?”

“Oliver, sweetheart,” Mrs. Rutledge rasped, her pack-an-hour voice like stones grinding together. “A friend of mine is coming in to pick up a special order. You’ll be there for ‘em, won’t you?”

Dread crept into my chest, cold and heavy. “Of course, Mrs. Rutledge.”

She hacked an angry, tortured laugh that crackled through the phone. “Thattaboy. Should be labelled with her name, got it?”

Dial tone rang in my ear before I could ask whose name I was looking for.

Tension shivered up my arms. All special orders were stored somewhere in the temperamental recesses of the basement, and I hated going down there. It was cold and damp one day, dry and dusty the next; the only consistency you could count on was the poorly-spaced flickering lights and a faint, sour scent wafting up from deeper within.

With a heavy sigh, I propped up the small sign signalling I was in the back, and slipped into the shop’s narrow aisles.

I wasn’t worried about people leaving without paying. If they wanted to steal from us, the consequences were on their heads, not mine.

I trailed the outskirts of the shop first; most days, the door to the basement could be found near the back of the shop, though that wasn’t a guarantee. I climbed over and under a maze of interlocking furniture threatening to spill out of its designated section like an overgrown fungus, and made a mental note to reorganize our living and dining sets. I avoided the dreaded doll section like the plague it was.

Mr. Callahan was near the back corner of the store, glancing between an array of shelves and what looked like an old, faded blueprint covered in nonsense, Escheresque lines. I almost stumbled into his back when my foot caught on a plastic plant spilling out of its pot; only quick reflexes and a sharp, and extremely unprofessional, bark of, “shit!” kept me from embarrassing myself. Mr. Callahan startled back, then hedged forward to steady me with a warm, broad hand on my shoulder. For a moment, my growing chill was chased away.

“Mr. Callahan!” I smiled to hide my wince, my voice creaking in my throat. “Sorry about that.”

He sighed. Conspicuously, he rolled up his blueprints and half-tucked them behind his back. “Not a problem, kid.”

I hadn’t intended on coming across him, but Mr. Callahan knew these dark recesses of the shop almost better than I did, myself. He’s our most regular customer, though…I can’t remember the last time I sold him anything.

I maintained my customer service smile. “Have you come across the basement today, by any chance?”

For a moment, he was quiet. His eyes narrowed. He inspected me like I was a zoo animal performing some particularly odd behaviour, and the back of my neck burned.

“Right there,” he said, thumb jerking behind him.

And so it was.

Somehow, I hadn’t noticed it until he pointed it out. The basement doorway hung open as it always did, a delicate brass chain draped across at waist-height holding up a hand-painted “Employees only” sign. A naked lightbulb illuminated the narrow steps and old wooden panelling of the walls. Sickly yellow light spilled out at the bottom of the stairs, glistening off freshly waxed tiles that filled my throat with unease. Our basement wasn’t usually so…pristine.

I approached the staircase, forcing myself to take slow, soothing breaths. “Thank you, Mr. Callahan.”

Carefully, I stepped over the chain and began to descend. I distantly heard Mr. Callahan grumbling, and the rustle of him unfurling his blueprints once more, but my head swam with the sound of buzzing incandescent lights and the throbbing silence pulsing up from the basement. The soles of my shoes clicked softly on the tiled steps. Already, the hot, sour tendrils of an unidentifiable scent drifted up and tickled my nose. I covered my mouth and nose with the sleeve of my sweater as I stepped out of the stairwell.

A long, narrow hallway stretched out before me. Flickering yellow light warped my sight just slightly; the floor appeared to slope upwards, the ceiling dipping down, like the hallway was narrowing and tightening, threatening to swallow me whole before I reached the door at the end.

I lifted my chin and strode up the hallway with purpose. It’s best not to show hesitation.

At the end of the hall, I unlocked the door with the same brass key I’d used to open the shop. The door swung open to a dimly lit storage room. Boxes sat stacked in haphazard piles—cardboard boxes, wooden chests, metal tackle boxes, any kind of container with a semblance of hinge or lid—and a bare lightbulb hung from a chain, swaying softly in the draft from the newly opened door. Odd geometric shadows stretched and swayed along the floor. I swallowed and tried not to stare too deeply into those shadows.

Skittering sounds echoed in the heavy quiet. Rats, I could only hope. The noises crept closer before ebbing away. Nearer, farther. Nearer, farther. I ignored the shiver crawling over my scalp and carefull...

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